GeForce GT 1030 vs GeForce GTS 250 512MB

Intro

Compare that to the GeForce GTS 250 512MB, which has GPU clock speed of 738 MHz, and 512 MB of GDDR3 memory set to run at 1100 MHz through a 256-bit bus. It also is made up of 128 Stream Processors, 64 Texture Address Units, and 16 ROPs.

Display Graphs

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Power Usage and Theoretical Benchmarks

Power Consumption (Max TDP)

GeForce GT 1030		30 Watts
GeForce GTS 250 512MB		145 Watts
	Difference: 115 Watts (383%)

Memory Bandwidth

In theory, the GeForce GTS 250 512MB will be 43% faster than the GeForce GT 1030 overall, because of its greater data rate. (explain)

GeForce GTS 250 512MB		70400 MB/sec
GeForce GT 1030		49152 MB/sec
	Difference: 21248 (43%)

Texel Rate

The GeForce GTS 250 512MB should be just a bit (approximately 17%) faster with regards to anisotropic filtering than the GeForce GT 1030. (explain)

GeForce GTS 250 512MB		47232 Mtexels/sec
GeForce GT 1030		40480 Mtexels/sec
	Difference: 6752 (17%)

Pixel Rate

The GeForce GT 1030 will be quite a bit (approximately 71%) faster with regards to FSAA than the GeForce GTS 250 512MB, and will be able to handle higher screen resolutions without slowing down too much. (explain)

GeForce GT 1030		20240 Mpixels/sec
GeForce GTS 250 512MB		11808 Mpixels/sec
	Difference: 8432 (71%)

Please note that the above 'benchmarks' are all just theoretical - the results were calculated based on the card's specifications, and real-world performance may (and probably will) vary at least a bit.

Price Comparison

Specifications

Memory Bandwidth: Bandwidth is the maximum amount of data (measured in MB per second) that can be transferred past the external memory interface in a second. It's calculated by multiplying the interface width by the speed of its memory. In the case of DDR memory, it should be multiplied by 2 once again. If DDR5, multiply by ANOTHER 2x. The better the card's memory bandwidth, the better the card will be in general. It especially helps with AA, HDR and higher screen resolutions.

Texel Rate: Texel rate is the maximum texture map elements (texels) that can be processed in one second. This number is worked out by multiplying the total number of texture units by the core speed of the chip. The better the texel rate, the better the video card will be at texture filtering (anisotropic filtering - AF). It is measured in millions of texels in one second.

Pixel Rate: Pixel rate is the maximum amount of pixels that the graphics card can possibly write to the local memory in one second - measured in millions of pixels per second. The number is calculated by multiplying the amount of colour ROPs by the the card's clock speed. ROPs (Raster Operations Pipelines - also sometimes called Render Output Units) are responsible for filling the screen with pixels (the image). The actual pixel rate is also dependant on many other factors, most notably the memory bandwidth of the card - the lower the bandwidth is, the lower the potential to reach the maximum fill rate.